By the East River and the Bronx
boys sang, stripped to the waist,
along with the wheels, oil, leather and hammers.
Ninety thousand miners working silver from rock
and the children drawing stairways and perspectives.

But none of them slumbered,
none of them wished to be river,
none loved the vast leaves,
none the blue tongue of the shore.

By East River and the Queensboro
boys battled with Industry,
and Jews sold the river faun
the rose of circumcision
and the sky poured, through bridges and rooftops,
herds of bison driven by the wind.

But none would stop,
none of them longed to be cloud,
none searched for ferns
or the tambourine's yellow circuit.

When the moon sails out
pulleys will turn to trouble the sky;
a boundary of needles will fence in memory
and coffins will carry off those who don't work.

New York of mud,
New York of wire and death.
What angel lies hidden in your cheek?
What perfect voice will speak the truth of wheat?
Who the terrible dream of your stained anemones?

Not for a single moment, Walt Whitman, lovely old man,
have I ceased to see your beard filled with butterflies,
nor your corduroy shoulders frayed by the moon,
nor your thighs of ****** Apollo,
nor your voice like a column of ash;
ancient beautiful as the mist,
who moaned as a bird does
its *** pierced by a nedle.
Enemy of the satyr,
enemy of the vine
and lover of the body under rough cloth.

Not for a single moment, virile beauty
who in mountains of coal, billboards, railroads,
dreamed of being a river of slumbering like a river
with that comrade who would set in your breast
the small grief of an ignorant leopard.

Not for a single moment, Adam of blood, Male,
man alone on the sea, Walt Whitman, lovely old man,
because on penthouse roofs,
and gathered together in bars,
emerging in squads from the sewers,
trembling between the legs of chauffeurs
or spinning on dance-floors of absinthe,
the maricas, Walt Whitman, point to you.

Him too! He's one! And they hurl themselves
at your beard luminous and chaste,
blonds from the north, blacks from the sands,
multitudes with howls and gestures,
like cats and like snakes
the maricas, Walt Whitman, maricas,
disordered with tears, flesh for the whip,
for the boot, or the tamer's bite.

Him too! He's one! Stained fingers
point to the shore of your dream,
when a friend eats your apple,
with its slight tang of petrol,
and the sun sings in the navels
of the boys at play beneath bridges.

But you never sough scratched eyes,
nor the darkest swamp where they drown the children,
nor the frozen saliva,
nor the curved wounds like a toad's belly
that maricas bear, in cars and on terraces,
while the moon whips them on terror's street-corners.

You sought a nakedness like a river.
Bull and dream taht would join the wheel to the seaweed,
father of  your agony, camellia of your death,
and moan in the flames of your hidden equator.

For it's right that a man not seek his delight
in the ****** jungle of approaching morning.
The sky has shores where life is avoided
and bodies that should not be echoed by dawn.

Agony, agony, dream, ferment and dream.
This is the world, my friend, agony, agony.
Bodies dissolve beneath city clocks,
war passes weeping with a million grey rats,
the rich give their darlings
little bright dying things,
and life is not noble, or sarcred, or good.

Man can, if he wishes, lead his desire
through a vein of coral or a heavenly ****.
Tomorrow loves will be stones and Time
a breeze that comes slumbering through the branches.

That's why I don't raise my voice, old Walt Whitman,
against the boy who inscribes
the name of a ******* his pillow,
nor the lad who dresses as a bride
in the shadow of the wardrobe,
nor the solitary men in clubs
who drink with disgust prostitution's waters,
nor against the men with the green glance
who love men and burn their lips in silence.
But yes, against you, city maricas,
of tumescent flesh and unclean thought.
Mothers of mud. Harpies. Unsleeping enemies
of Love  that bestows garlands of joy.

Against you forever, you who give boys
drops of foul death with bitter poison.
Against you forever,
Fairies of North America,
Párajos of Havana,
Jotos of Mexico,
Sarasas of Cádiz,
Apios of Seville,
Cancos of Madrid,
Floras of Alicante,
Adelaidas of Portugal.

Maricas of all the world, muderers of doves!
Slaves to women. Their boudoir *******.
Spread in public squares like fevered fans
or ambushed in stiff landscapes of hemlock.

No quarter! Death
flows from your eyes
and heaps grey flowers at the swamp's edge.
No quarter! Look out!!
Let the perplexed, the pure,
the classical, noted, the supplicants
close the gates of the bacchanal to you.

And you, lovely Walt Whitman, sleep on the banks of the Hudson
with your beard towards the pole and your hands open.
Bland clay or snow, your tongue is calling
for comrades to guard your disembodied gazelle.

Sleep: nothing remains.
A dance of walls stirs the praries
and America drown itself in machines and lament.
I long for a fierce wind that from deepest night
shall blow the flowers and letters from the vault where you sleep
and a ***** boy to tell the whites and their gold
that the kingdom of wheat has arrived.

The rosary slips
between fingers,
pushed by thumb,
prayers said, saying,

praying. The nun
feels cramp in her
thigh, ache of knee.
Bell to ring, light

through crack in
shutters, seeps.
Like that time in
Paris. Young then,

bells from some
church, he saying,
we must visit the
Sacre Coeur. Did,

too, later, their hands
holding, thoughts
of love. That thin
sliver of light through

cracks in that shutter.
He beside her, body
warm, hands folded
between his thighs,

prayer like. Pater
Noster, thumb moves
beads, skin on wood.
And he said, Paris is

built on the bones of
the dead, he looking
straight into her eyes,
dark eyes, pools of

smooth liquid passion.
The bell rings, Matins,
she thumbs away the
last bead, prayers said,

on flight to her God.
Knees ache, thigh crampy,
she rubs to ease. He
rubbed like that, her

thigh, his hands, warm
and slowly. Rubs slowly
now, she and her hand,
to ease. Pain, what is

it for? Questions, answers,
always there. Coinage,
pain, to pay back, debt
for sins, hers, others,

here, in Purgatory. She
ceases to rub, puts rosary
down, lets it hang from
her belt as she walks from

her cell(room) along passage,
down stairs, not to rush, said
Sister Hugh, not to rush.
She holds up the hem so

as not to rub. Into the cloister,
early morning light just
about to come over the
high walls. Chill, touches,

hands, fingers, bend, open,
bend. He showed her this
trick with a coin, his hand
open, the coin there, then

he closed and opened, and
it had gone, vanished, had
mouth open, and he laughed.
Never did show how was

done, have faith, he said
laughing. The cloister, walls
high, church tower, red bricks,
flower garden around below

the walls. Silence. She learnt
that, not easy being a woman,
tongue still, interior silence,
also, Sister Josephine said,

inner silence. Harder to keep,
the inner voice hushed. She
passes the statue of Our Lady,
flowers, prayer papers, pieces,

tucked in crannies, under flower,
vases. Santa Maria audi nos.
He was coming to her, took
her in his arms and kissed her

lips, that cold morning after
the party, Paris, art, music,
it was all there. She enters
the church, puts fingers into

stoup, blessed water, makes
sigh of cross from head to
breast to breast. Sunlight seeps
through glass windows, stone

flag floor, cold, shiny, smooth.
His lips on hers, flesh on flesh,
tongue touching tongue. Long
ago, best forget, let it go. She

sits in her choir stall, takes up
breviary, thumbs through pages.
Prayer pieces of paper, many
requests sent. This one's mother

has cancer, deadly, her prayers
requested for recovery. Not
impossible, faith says so. But
she doubts, always the doubt.

She'll pray, ask, request, ask
God, for supplicants request,
but God knows best. He sees all.
Knows all. Knows me, she

thinks, better than I know myself.
Cogito ergo sum, Descartes said,
and he said it,too. He in his
pyjamas, so ****, uttering the

Descartes, hands open. I think,
there, I am, he said, I am,(naked)
therefore, I think. He laughed.
Other nuns enter, take their place

in choir stalls, sound of sandals
on wood, books being opened,
prayers whispered. Bells ring,
Mother Abbess, enters, all lower

head. Where did he go after
having *** with you? she never
did know, not then, some things
best not known. O Lord open

my lips. Shut down my thoughts.
She makes the sign of the cross.
Finger, *******, from
forehead to breast to breast.

Smells, air, fresh, stale, bodies,
old wood and stone, she standing,
praying, all together, all alone.

As long as we are ruled by madness, hounds
will devour fetuses still in their wombs,
mines will sprout in wheat fields, and even
the crossed light of morning will be eye-fire.

We’ll see the young hanged, wronged
at the dawn prayer. It’s an age witness
to a snarling pig fouling mosques.

When madness rules, there are white flowers
on the ruined branches, emptiness
in a child’s eyes, no kindness, no faith, no
dignity held sacred. All fates futureless,

everything present worthless. As long as madness
rules, the children of Baghdad can only guess
why they wander hunger’s thorns,

why they share the bread of death, why off
in the distance, American Indians
hover in the cold, why greed shouts them down,
every race crawling ghost-hearted.

Through blood-colored streets, between humiliation
and disbelief, crippled shadows creep,
and the madness-hounds howl in our minds.

We are on our way to death.



The children of Baghdad scream in the streets
as Hulagu’s army pounds the city’s doors
like an epidemic; his grandchildren roar
over the bodies of our young.

The wings of wild birds are blood rivers,
black claws claw eyes—all this cracks the silence.

The Tigris River remembers those days, so look
behind the curtain of history—how many
aggressors have passed through the centuries
of our land, and still we resist?

Hulagu will die, and the Iraqi children
will dance in front of Degla. We are not
to be hanged from all corners of Baghdad.

*

A river can be a weapon against injustice on the earth.
A palm can be a weapon against injustice.
A garden can be a weapon.

Among the water, in the silence
of tunnels, though we hate death,
for God and right we will set fire forever
to your refusal that Islam is holy.

Baghdad, ***** by tyranny, your children
are raising flags. Where are the Arabs
and the white swords, wild horses, glorious families?

Some of them were condemned, some
fled shameful, some stripped and gave away
their clothes, and some are lined up in the devil’s hall
to get their share of the spoils.

And people ask about a great nation’s ruins,
but nothing remains of that shining empire
that spans from the ocean to the gulf.



Every calamity has its cause.

They sold the horses and traded in
the knights in the market of rhetoric:
Down with history! Long live hot air!

Death comes to the children of Baghdad
in the smallest toys, in the parks, in restaurants,
in the dust. Walls collapse on the procession of history,
shame upon civilization, shame from a thousand borders.

From the unknown, a missile charges,
“Where are the weapons of mass destruction?”

Will daylight come again after the ****** smile
has been erased, after planes block the sunrays,
and our dreams spurt suicidal blood?

By what law do you demolish our homes,
and flood fire upon a thousand minarets?

In Baghdad, days pass, from hunger to hunger,
thirst to thirst, under the gaze of the master
of the mansion, the thousand-masked face.
Will there never be an end to this nonsense?

The curtain rises: we are the beginning.

To starve people—is this honor?
“To prey upon supplicants”—that’s the glorious slogan of victory?
To chase children from one house to another—the joy of tyranny.

These days, people have the right to humiliation, submission,
death in every atom, and the chronic question,
“Where are the weapons of mass destruction?”



The children of Baghdad are playing in schools:
a ball here, a ball there, a child here, a child there,
a pen here, a pen there, a mine here, a death there.
Among the fragments, the cactus.

There were children here yesterday,
fluttering like pigeons in open spaces.
One of these days, dawn might lighten the universe,
but for now the sun of justice is far below the horizon.



Despite sacrifice, there is a dark gluttony:
some are faithful, and some are sellouts.

Oh nation of Mohammad, my heart longs for Al Hussein.
Oh Baghdad, land of Caliph Rasheed,
oh castle of history, and once-glorious age,
the two moments between night and day are death and feast.



Among the martyrs’ fragments,
the throne of the universe, shaken by a young voice.
The dark night leaves when a new day flows.

Oh land of Al Rasheed, don’t lose hope, every tyranny ends:
a child adores Baghdad, holds a white notebook and flowers,
paper and poetry, some piasters from the last feast.

**

Behind his eyes, a tear that won’t break
but flows like light deep in his heart: the picture
of his father who left one day and never returned.
The child embraces ashes, and stays a long time.

A thread of blood runs through his mouth;
his voice and shed blood are one.
His features washed out; all of this world is separation.

The child whispers, I long for Baghdad’s day.
Who said oil is worth more than blood?

Don’t ache, Baghdad, don’t surrender.
Although there is dissent in this blind time,
there is, in the far horizon, a wave of visions.

Although the dream is distant, it rises. Rise,
and spread my bones in the Tigris River,
so daylight will one day rise over my funeral procession.

God is greater than the madness of death.
Who said oil is worth more than blood?

The Ides of March had come
but its Sun was not yet cold
when Spurinna reminded me
what his augury  had foretold

Some good men tried to warn me
About the risks I take-
But Caesar has no need of guards
I look Death in the face.

Calpurnia asked me not to go
Based on her silly dream
But the Parthian war won’t be derailed
By some Republican’s scheme

The supplicants surround me with petitions,
Bur I, impatient, moved to turn away.
Casca grabbed the draping of my toga
and bared me,  awkwardly, to start the fray.

The first dagger found my flesh
and left a superficial wound.
I wrested the dagger from his hands
and swept the blade to clear some room.

They are too many that surround me.
Too many of their thrusts strike home
Brutus my son, “Et Tu, Brute”
I cover my face to die alone.

Bleeding, powerless, dying,
No one must see me as I lay.
My dignity must be preserved
for I am uncommon clay.

Broad shouldered lions
stand over the ocean’s quietude,
roaring thunder in the surf,
thudding sand laden questions
with salt soaked and matted paws.

Surly supplicants beseech the sea,
whose tides answer only to the sun and moon.
A lions home is the African veldt,
so, go home king of hearts…
The seeker leads and the answers follow.

For, what gives the lion his strength,
is the softness of his dreams.

We shall need

a very private
language for this.

Let us create it.

A language
for lovers,
not strangers.

We are those lovers,
supplicants at this altar.

These syllables
will bind us
in lovers knots.

The ceremony begins.

We shelter
in our bodies
holy flesh
steadily chanting
this communion.

Slowly touching,
slowly turning,
slowly burning,

we begin the dance.

We whirl
until we merge

and the magic
takes hold

as we pronounce

in sounds never
heard before,

the incantation
of a spell
that begins
with words,

but ends
in ecstasy.
   ~mce

There is a moment
    When sunlight bathes the trees
    And your thoughts
    My dear, dear friend
    Invade me.

    You seem to love the morning
    When our room is cool
    And paper, pen and attitude
    Anchor an old fool
    Bowing  fore  your witness
    Reaching out for lines
    Winding towards your inner life
    And sketching it in rhymes.
    So soft your silent whispers
    But clear and hardly grave
    Patiently you  elevate
    These aging earthbound ways.
    Why such generosity
    Beloved friend of messy me?
    Perhaps. . .
    When time is near an end
    And meeting on a star
    You will share your name
    Down here and how
    I knew you then.
    Until that  day when music plays
    Around and through our souls
    We  grasp the air and strain
    To hear the cadence of your strolls
    As we hope to be so still
    And clearly hear your voice.
    So busy we remain
    Both supplicants and prey
    Chasing our discordant days
    Contradictions near  your side
    As sunlight bathes the morning trees
    With songs of immortality.
    May we always walk  afar
    Singing with a morning star
    Reuniting earth with heaven
    Brothers in this  house forever.

“He is a dreamer; let us leave him – pass.” Julius Caesar I.ii.24

Strident philosophers at Hyde Park Corner
Poor buskers at Queen Victoria’s feet
Chalk artists remaking the pavement as Rome
A Seventh Sister with her folk guitar

These are not dreamers passive in their beds
Or supplicants awaiting permission:
They are the worker bees; they know of pain
And sweat, and sunstroke in the fields - and truth

When a sidewalk artist notes that the Ides
Have come, Caesar indeed should turn to hear

I drove four miles this evening
Down the road to see the miracle
Of pastures greening.

They'd come to life this Spring
To lick the rivulets of melting snow,
Lichens before wild grasses, glistening,
But then a blistering summer blow
Came to patch their roots.

Just last week a quarter inch of wet
Fell from a Treasury on high
To tell the famished carpet,
"Wait a while! Storm clouds are nigh!"

And yesterday a full wet inch
Of heaven's grace and mercy flowed
From the billowed Throne's high bench
To rally grassy supplicants to grow.

To sell the body is seen a sin
when the skin is currency
while the buyers flock around
with payment held close at hand

once the exchange has occurred
away realms of chastity
the supplicants deign to condemn
the very source of ecstasy

to decry the pleasures gained
saves the face of holy men
when due fairness is applied
between the partners of the act

their honor clutched is a sham
like the masks devoutly worn
when the imp comes to call
evoking lust in high and low

the urge is fed for a time
few may last when it returns
ask yourself why dogmas lie
when suggesting otherwise

to sell the body is a boon
stooping low to holy plans
only asking for respect
while others wear their saintliness.

© 2019. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20190201.

For Yue **** Yidhna
And All Who Brew Morning Poetry  for the World

You are neither barista nor priestess
Even though perhaps a little bit of both
You do not serve either McDonald or Tim
But rather the supplicants who approach

Who plead with you to offer them the Cup
Of transient peace and hope in this sad world
A layered paper chalice wherein is borne
Colombian savour, healing and warm

And it is from your hands that they receive
A special blessing, and strength for their day

I talk too much,
I don't say enough;
Nothing is the answer,
Everything is a question.
Freedom of thought is a lie
if it is unchallenged, freedom
to manifest a thought-pattern
means nothing without a will
to stand against these tides.
Reject that homogeneity
imposed by the socio-
cultural overmind.
We are too easily

led astray by our
persecutors
so we must adhere
to The Way
as supplicants before
hallucination.

Psychonauts,
Dissonauts,
Oneironauts; we are
all of us cognitive dissidents
practicing configurations of consciousness

Mindless hate
Fueling,
The spectacle
Ruling
The idol lies
Hypnotized,
Slavishly drooling
Like homeschooling
******
In repressed
Insecure
And alone,
Unexpressed
Will turn into
A war
For your loyalty
Soil,
Your toil,
Your vote
For the royalty’s
Dynasty’s
Building a moat
And awoke
Is unwelcome
Just go back to sleep
As they reap your American dreams
Counting sheep

By: Cedric McClester

The devil does exist
He’s living in our midst
But William Barr insists
That he’s not a liar
While impressing those
Much higher
Beware to the buyer
The situation’s dire

The devil does exist
If you get my gist
And let me tell you this
That he’s not a joke
Look at how
He goes for broke
Smell the sulfur  
From his smoke

The devil does exist
And those who can’t resist
Are on his naughty list
They gladly sell their souls
While assuming
Their various roles
That he’s assigned to them
They all bow down to him

The devil does exist
And so we should resist
He’s looking to enlist
Willing supplicants
To follow him
Like a colony of ants
Then they take a chance
By lowering their pants










Cedric McClester, Copyright © 2019.  All rights reserved.

Once the sun rose in the south
like the fowl by the same name
regular enough to set a watch
this ascension of desire’s push
promising much as consequence
if the eye can be believed
even as the owner sleeps
still embraced by wanton dreams

then to wake against the day
asking rutting in payment
to witness god’s greatest gift
bequeathed to eager supplicants
to sate the fire that burns within
the showers pelt in response
by sparse cloud’s drizzling
or the tempest’s drowning fist

this revelry in dawn’s face
expected at daybreak’s light
is now left behind in the years
with only pain to end the night
the sun has set forever more
no longer rising like days of yore
and while the fowl may share the name
no crow is heard at first of day.

© 2019. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20190203.

frankincense becomes the vapour that I savour

In the catacombs I look into cold unwelcoming rooms

the tomb of the priest betrays him

Less ornate as his God seems to hate the ostentatious

even in death and the tomb there's no room for the show off or braggart


but you can
**** in the face of the dreamer, this place is beyond all redemption

the supplicants supperate as
they wait for forgiveness
his highness denies them
and casts out
unholy men.


lesser men might live but there's
no turn or no quarter to give in this dark place,
no warmth to give succour to neither man nor his saviour
we may as well abandon all hope.

the redeeming feature is myself, a sentient creature born of the womb

on these floors in this tomb
I face inwards.

The Givers


Sunday evening sermon and as the parishioners
leave this up-market church, some are in a good
mood and feel generous towards the beggars at
the door and give coins, others, of moral frugal
hearts are busy reading a leaflet- handed out in
the church- and thus didn’t see the supplicants.

Had a fifty centimes coin in my pocket, which
I intended to the man with the Labrador-hound
as I did so the dog followed the transaction with
serious eyes, as far as the dog understood it, its
master was higher up on the human hierarchy
then me, after all, I was the one doing the giving.

by Ryan P. Kinney and Aaron Shinkle
With additional content assembled from Eli Williams and Lennart Lundh

The fall of man

It was the end of monsters
The end of mothers
The end of haters
Of lovers
Of pain and suffering
Of bliss and ecstasy

Nothing to hide under the bed
No terror floating in your head
Just the buzzing and swarming of insects

There was just the animalistic need to survive
And Gaia had decided
It was best for her survival
If we did not

Truth be told
We did it to ourselves

Some future digger after truth,
alien or human, kneeling with
trowel and brush at this grave,
will note in clear, careful script
the wonder that a people would
be so deliberate with the smallest
of their gods' creatures,
and so careless of themselves.

One never sees the monster
Hiding in the open
No one ever suspects that we are hiding something
When they are staring it in the face

We walked upon the new Earth
Like we did on the Old
Tugging along our gravel hearts
On broken asphalt
Our eyes slowly
Moving towards the new sky
The clouds, like curtains, unfolded
Our feet freshly cleansed of old
Traditions and assumptions that we
would never make it to this moment
But no one knew what was past
That port of no return
The ship sailed away,
Faded out of view

Another layer chipped away like
Hardened clay
The people here aspire to be
Nothing more than alive
The lives of the New World
In the hands of strangers
Coexisting within each other
For fear of never existing again
This is their lifeline, their blood
They are all in this repopulation
Together

we see others as they are
we see ourselves at every age
and all at once
supplicants, praying for tomorrow.
Everything from nothing.
And to nothing we return.
To the whole of the way,
We hastened our downfall through an illusion of control.
Only through letting this run its course
And stepping to the center could we hope for survival

The lights one by one dim
The music softens
The actors bow,
We close the curtain on this world

Imagination is confined
behind the bars of dogma’s ire
seeking freedom to run free
playing with the celebrants

fantastic dreams are stillborn
when they live in empty halls
supplicants ask their boon
from the Lords that hold the keys

many cried for relief’s balm
as the doors were barred within
curtains pulled to withhold
lurid light from those below

dreams are sought beyond the walls
empty promises without hope
when the muse is contained
encouragement is hard to find

these bulwarks defy the strong
artists starving for impulse
to achieve something more
than simple minds may suppose

in the end the ramparts stand
between the craftsman now denied
what they seek to conceive
no longer serving fantasies.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20180609.

I heard them cry on their knees
as song to state earthly goals
asking for a set outcome
be it base or sacrosanct
the exalted saw the rugged cross
high up on the hill top
the others rode the prancing horse
with equal fervor of the first.

Those in song were supplicants
abiding by emotion's draw
the writer shared this through tune
now I'm captive to his muse
adoration is both their kink
one for God, the other crotch
spanning both the high and low
yet fair verse does not judge.

Stanzas express a burning need
so my ears are thus informed
emotion becomes the only path
drawn along the singer's voice
bless the muse for these goals
artistry beyond the pale
with music as the catalyst
I'll be torn to listen more.

Now my shoulders are a perch
imp and angel on each one
keen to sway my reeling mind
to their side, the right kind
though I suspect, I'll say this
that a tune will tap my foot
and if I like the end result
I will listen to both of them.

© 2017. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20170526.

I'm not cut out
From the cloth
Of the beggar
No morally purer
Than drunken bootleggers
Don't claim to be better
Than junkies
And thieves
And in fact
Often share
In their proclivities
When my conscience agrees
To be righteously wrong
For the sake
Of forsaken
Virtues, all along
I have known to be merely
In theory
No more
Than the voice
In the back of my head
I ignore
When imploring me to
Ask it
What would God do?
Perhaps suffer the many
And save but a few
Of the most loyal supplicants
Bowing to none of it
Proving the makers
Who made us
Are done with it

A wealthy old American, perhaps like you or I
Lay down to sleep in his comfortable bed
And, in the darkness, died.

Imagine his shock and his dismay,
This man who had it all and more,
To find himself an immigrant
Cast up on heaven’s shore.

The cherubim and Seraphim
All cast disdainful glances
At this importunate immigrant.
They didn’t like his chances.

“Heaven is quite full enough!”
The elect, in unison, said.
“We’re sure you’ll find a fit in Hell
Perhaps try there instead””

The poor man looked from face to face
But no mercy could he find.
Treated like a ******* sort-
Ignored and cast aside.

He wandered, homeless, cloud to cloud,
But no rest did he find.
An illegal tossed between Heaven and Hell
Bereft of Kin and kind.

For those who sit in judgement here
May find the tables turned
When they themselves are supplicants,
When it is they who yearn..

Assembled by Eli Williams and Ryan P. Kinney
From works by Lennart Lundh, Gabriella Ercolani, Vicki Acquah, Ayla Atash, Russ Vidrick, Chuck Joy
Additional original content by Eli Williams and Ryan P. Kinney

Some future digger after truth,
alien or human, kneeling with
trowel and brush at this grave,
will note in clear, careful script
the wonder that a people would
be so deliberate with the smallest
of their gods' creatures,
and so careless of themselves.

They walked upon the new Earth
Like they did on the Old
Tugging along their gravel hearts
On freshly laid asphalt
Their eyes slowly
Moving towards the new sky
The clouds, like curtains, unfolded
Their feet freshly cleansed of old
Traditions and assumptions that they
would never make it to this great moment
But no one knew what was past
That port of no return
The ship sailed away,
Faded out of view
The lights one by one dim
The music softens
The actors bow,

Bewildered is the conscience of a dancer
whose unified self wishes to remain true
to a lover,
to family,
a social circle.
Yet a facet of the face must make love
to the masses;
each hungry audience that idolizes the mask,
she slowly exposes.

Another layer chipped away like
Hardened clay
The people here aspire to be
Nothing more than alive
The lives of the New World
In the hands of strangers
Coexisting within each other
For fear of never existing again
This is their lifeline, their blood
They are all in this repopulation
Together

They are husband and wife, or lovers.
They are childhood sweethearts
become best friends against adversity.
Or supplicants, praying for tomorrow.

But when your empty heart is weighed
"what are you really worth?"

I am vapor
An ethereal mist that permeates through all people
Unknown that I have infected them
That my heaviness weighs on their soul

You stand here, asking me,
“What do I want?”

I want to be light
Free,
Not a particle that jams up people’s souls
But something that invigorates them

She presses her hand to the bulletproof safety glass
And meekly whispers,
“Well, what do they say?”

They say I shouldn’t be so tired
They say I should get a job
They say I should get off this couch
They say I shouldn’t be a blob

They say I should feel,
Live
Create
His hands move wildly in the air
Miming a paint brush; a hammer
A tool of destruction; creation
He weaves his hands as though he is dancing to his own genesis


Simple and intense
As the splattered paint on a Jackson ******* canvas

we see others as they are
we see ourselves at every age
and all at once

All colors and their absence mourn--
White page, black pen design the mind.
Bare bodies blow Gabe's copper horn.
They leave a twisted trail behind.
What's left unwrit is lionspeak,
Transcripted worse than poetry
Encaged in shops that smell and creak
From correlated symmetry.
Unbending letters, cold steel rails
Truss up irrelevant decrees,
But broken grammar jams and flails
From supplicants on what were knees
Aa ee ii o u
Come hear what's lost, spit out in blue.

Beauty snares the supplicants
supping at the poisoned fount
far too late the trap is sprung
as the victims seek for more
there is a story behind the tears
as the mind is turned against
those who follow far behind
also led to toast their chains.

Infancy came with the charge
to walk a path none few would have
after life has savaged them
still the young are brought within
arrayed by surface symmetry
determination is then made
by a world that consumes
with no thought of consequence.

Once the gate has closed behind
those deluded by the charm
run the conveyor with no end
chasing comely will-o-wisps
what came before is soon lost
as the years impose their price
whispering promises falling short
wisdom comes far too late.

Empowerment of the young
a promise made for betterment
becomes the bitter manacles
when the lie is revealed
if only death was an end
once the curse is disclosed
instead the living carry on
to bring fresh beauty to the fount.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20180402.

by Ryan P. Kinney and Aaron Shinkle
With additional content assembled from Eli Williams and Lennart Lundh

The fall of man

It was the end of monsters
The end of mothers
The end of haters
Of lovers
Of pain and suffering
Of bliss and ecstasy

Nothing to hide under the bed
No terror floating in your head
Just the buzzing and swarming of insects

There was just the animalistic need to survive
And Gaia had decided
It was best for her survival
If we did not

Truth be told
We did it to ourselves

Some future digger after truth,
alien or human, kneeling with
trowel and brush at this grave,
will note in clear, careful script
the wonder that a people would
be so deliberate with the smallest
of their gods' creatures,
and so careless of themselves.

One never sees the monster
Hiding in the open
No one ever suspects that we are hiding something
When they are staring it in the face

We walked upon the new Earth
Like we did on the Old
Tugging along our gravel hearts
On broken asphalt
Our eyes slowly
Moving towards the new sky
The clouds, like curtains, unfolded
Our feet freshly cleansed of old
Traditions and assumptions that we
would never make it to this moment
But no one knew what was past
That port of no return
The ship sailed away,
Faded out of view

Another layer chipped away like
Hardened clay
The people here aspire to be
Nothing more than alive
The lives of the New World
In the hands of strangers
Coexisting within each other
For fear of never existing again
This is their lifeline, their blood
They are all in this repopulation
Together

we see others as they are
we see ourselves at every age
and all at once
supplicants, praying for tomorrow.
Everything from nothing.
And to nothing we return.
To the whole of the way,
We hastened our downfall through an illusion of control.
Only through letting this run its course
And stepping to the center could we hope for survival

The lights one by one dim
The music softens
The actors bow,
We close the curtain on this world

One decision invites much more
a new world to explore
this is the promise few will test
when change is pain most resist

that door awaits beyond the now
the one that fearful disallow
while opened with apparent ease
the craven pretend there’s no relief

by virtue of alert reserve
the status quo is then preserved
trapped in amber cast by fright
anxiety becomes pure delight

those choices few will embrace
don’t doubt the past could be erased
if supplicants move past their locks
placed to stop a life resolved.

© 2019. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20191219.